


all unsuspecting

by MK_Marlowe



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Introspection, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 08:33:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13853979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MK_Marlowe/pseuds/MK_Marlowe
Summary: It takes Gimli a while to realize that he is in love.





	all unsuspecting

...

A Dwarf may find their craft at any age, in any manner: a slow, solemn awareness of the song of metal in the veins; the bright, fire-woken rightness of a pick swung to strike stone like a bell. Craft, like love, takes its hold. For some, craft takes all of love, and there is as much joy in that as in marriage. And yet.

For a very long time, Gimli Gloin's son had suspected his craft must fill all of his heart, and had despaired.

...

There is beauty in the turn of an axe, in the rhythm of breath that sustains a warrior in the fight. But this is birthright of every Dwarf, and to be a general--no, that is not Gimli's craft. 

The chime of the hammer and the sweet heat of the forge, this is like home. This is hearth. But it does not light the deep places of his heart, and make him yearn to become. 

In gems, in their hidden facets, he finds some sense of kinship, of fellow feeling: the examination, day after breathless day, the gleam of promise, of something meant to show--this, here, this. For a hundred years, Gimli has searched himself, ready to cleave, ready to break if that is what is required to bring that light into his darkest self and, at last, be recognized.

But even in the reflection of the fairest crystal, he cannot understand the secrets in his own eyes.

And yet there is no one, no one at all, brave nor fair, wild nor wise, who can shake the stillness that has settled in his heart, in his bones.

...

Four master pieces he has crafted, in his lifetime. Four pieces that so captured the essence of the gem, the hidden form, the possibility-- Gimli has long been a master crystal-smith. He has no fear in the long days it may take to tease out the secrets of an uncut stone. 

That is to say, he is unaccustomed to fear. 

This is simply the way of Dwarves, who are not made to bend the knee or bow the head. Fear will turn to fire in the blood, and a great roar in the lungs-- Khazad ai-menu! 

And so it is he accepts a certain unfulfillment, a certain lack within himself. Accepts it, and stops searching. Stops hoping. 

Perhaps this is why it takes so very blasted long for him to understand.

"Where you go, I will go," is what he says at last, and hears all the hidden halls of his heart begin to echo.

...

**Author's Note:**

> "Where you go, I will go." The Two Towers


End file.
